Most powerful/underpowered Ethos?

[WhiteWeasel]

I play stellaris for the most part casually and with mods, that alter balance and whatnot. So I'm not all that used to vanilla nor do I powergame all that much. The other day when sharing our races we made, someone (Xenophobe player) told that that if you play xenophile you lose. And it got me thinking.

From a power gaming or PVP perspective is the xenophobe - xenophile gap really that bad? Or was that person being really pretentious?

 

[Elfwind]

Xenophile is... ironically bad at getting xenos in your empire because it's dependent on who is around you. NOW that said, if you gene mod your pops like crazy and let them migrate around you can get the same effect or even greater (especially strong with charismatic) and have no happiness issues. Not being able to do certain things to primitives and other stuff really makes it not worth it. Also patron the artist enclave till they give you the special building and you'll have the non-fanatic xenophile trait free.

If you want to play an inclusive empire just take charismatic. It'll get you to patronizing with the Xenophile fallen empire, and help everyone like you enough to make migration treaties or integrate after you conquer them with struggle cuddles.

You can also take collectivist or wait for old gods chain to get slaves if that's your thing too.

 

[RedPearlA]

In SP the main advantage that xenophiles have is a diplo bonus with all or almost all non-xenophobe nations. The value of the diplo bonus depends on the settings that are being used. With normal settings on high difficulty I think that xenophile is much stronger then xenophobe.

 

[Pooks1]

Depends on what you combine it with, some of my strongest empires were xenophile + militarist + spirit/mat/colect. I would also pick charismatic as a trait, so with all that in mind you have a species that can easily have good realtions with others, isn't too much restricted when it comes to warfare and can have another bonus. This usually resulted in my empire growing huge and being able to take on awakened FE's.

 

[WhiteWeasel]

Depends on what you combine it with, some of my strongest empires were xenophile + militarist + spirit/mat/colect. I would also pick charismatic as a trait, so with all that in mind you have a species that can easily have good realtions with others, isn't too much restricted when it comes to warfare and can have another bonus. This usually resulted in my empire growing huge and being able to take on awakened FE's.

I usually play as a die hard research/ fanatic materialist faction. I picked xenophile as it's minor ethos for mostly fluff reasons, though the gene modding trick is something that I didn't notice and will take advantage of.

 

[henzington]

Individualist is actually quite strong combined with materialist. The energy bonus and happy bonus from individualist happiness building plus the direct democracy make even opposite ethos pops happy enough that ethic drift is a nonissue. Fanatic Spiritualist plus the divine mandate plus the spiritualist temple gives tons of - ethics divergence but you still have to deal with unhappy pops till they match your ethos.

 

[Drowe]

What I haven't understood so far is how that Xenophobia modifier works. If it affects happiness, a combination of individualist+materialist+xenophile would be able to stack insane amounts of happiness modifiers, especially if you add the charismatic trait.

 

[Stoßtrupp Gold]

Xenophobe pops get a happiness malus if there are unenslaved xenos on the same planet.
Xenophile pops get a happiness bonus if there are unenslaved xenos.
Though i didn´t recognised any happiness modifiers from materialist.

 

[Alblaka]

I feel like any discussion comparing ethics right now is 100% pointless, given how much they will change in less then 3 weeks time. We can't properly compare the new ethics without actually playing them in-depth, either.

But, on a per-definition basis, the ethics SHOULD be approximately balanced to each other and promote a variety of different, viable playstyles.

 

[Black_Shade]

Xenophile and Pacifist are probably the weakest ones, simply because of how they restrict native interaction. It essentially blocks off many of the best planets that you would have been able to take for the price of 2 or 3 armies if you were anything else. It's a horrible trade off for pretty mediocre benefits. Not being able to colonize 5-10 of the best planets in your starting for essentially free is a huge price to pay that no other ethos has to deal with.

 

[Drowe]

Xenophobe pops get a happiness malus if there are unenslaved xenos on the same planet.
Xenophile pops get a happiness bonus if there are unenslaved xenos.
Though i didn´t recognised any happiness modifiers from materialist.

Individualist+Materialist for Direct Democracy/Subconscious Consensus gives +5%/+10% happiness to all pops

 

[sdeezie]

IMO Fanatic Militarist is very much worth considering if you intend to come out as Galactic Overlord - not even because of the damage bonuses, but because it increases the likelihood of you drawing weapons technologies to research, which is a major bonus while you're still on the way to top-tier tech.

After losing a game because I was always behind on fleet tech, despite being teched-up in other fields, I realized that "weighting the deck" for technology is a big deal,. It's not really an exposed mechanic, either. I learned that it happens by looking at the technology pages on the Stellaris Wiki.

 

[Nesjamag]

I find fanatic spiritualist + pacifist OP. At least for my play style.

Transcendant republic gives +10% happiness and -20% food.
I rarely need more than a frontier clinic to provide enough food and a paradise dome (pacifist building). So all my other tiles can go to more useful buildings.

Fanatic spiritualist gives -30% ethics divergence. So ethics is pretty much never a concern.
This makes the liberate and vassalize strategy extremely potent.

Pacifist gives +5% happiness in peace time, which is the vast majority of my games.
Paradise dome from pacifist gives +10% happiness and +5% habitability.
There is the option to form enlightened or irenic monarchy as pacifist, giving access to royal gardens for extra +10% happiness. I never need this.

What my empire looks like:
My planets have frontier hospital and paradise dome for food, and they drown in food with those even on 25 tile planets. No hydroponics on top of this. All other buildings are used for energy, minerals or research.
90-100% happiness everywhere, usually 95-100%. There are exceptions among alien species in my empire. But it's exceptional to even see some alien pops here and there go below 75% happiness. It usually happens when I do quick integration (asap after war) on the edges of my empire. At that points it's irrelevant though.

Happiness: +10% from leader, +10% from government, +10% from paradise dome, +5% from peace, +5% from communal, +5% from Riggan spice, +10% from skill 5 governors in sectors.
On top of these come event related happiness and artist enclave festivals.
This means massive bonuses to everything.

Ethics divergence is -50%. Fanatic spiritualist -30%, Satramene gas -10%, Muutagan crystals -10%. From happiness: -16 to -20%, planetary capital -15%, conformists -20% (tend to use this on other species I integrate). If more is required, symbol of unity building for -10%.
Even across the galaxy my ethics divergence can stay negative.

The result is a play through with little conflict. It's very peaceful, turmoil free, and very diverse. I tend to end up with lots of species in my empire.
Expansion through war is easy by liberating. With all the -ethics divergence the vassal changes it's culture gradually and eventually you can easily integrate, ending up with aliens with high happiness.
I've not had horizon signals when playing as fanatic spiritualist/pacifist yet. That'd be an extra +10% happiness and -5% ethics divergence.

 

[Black_Shade]

I find fanatic spiritualist + pacifist OP. At least for my play style.

Transcendant republic gives +10% happiness and -20% food.
I rarely need more than a frontier clinic to provide enough food and a paradise dome (pacifist building). So all my other tiles can go to more useful buildings.

Fanatic spiritualist gives -30% ethics divergence. So ethics is pretty much never a concern.
This makes the liberate and vassalize strategy extremely potent.

Pacifist gives +5% happiness in peace time, which is the vast majority of my games.
Paradise dome from pacifist gives +10% happiness and +5% habitability.
There is the option to form enlightened or irenic monarchy as pacifist, giving access to royal gardens for extra +10% happiness. I never need this.

What my empire looks like:
My planets have frontier hospital and paradise dome for food, and they drown in food with those even on 25 tile planets. No hydroponics on top of this. All other buildings are used for energy, minerals or research.
90-100% happiness everywhere, usually 95-100%. There are exceptions among alien species in my empire. But it's exceptional to even see some alien pops here and there go below 75% happiness. It usually happens when I do quick integration (asap after war) on the edges of my empire. At that points it's irrelevant though.

Happiness: +10% from leader, +10% from government, +10% from paradise dome, +5% from peace, +5% from communal, +5% from Riggan spice, +10% from skill 5 governors in sectors.
On top of these come event related happiness and artist enclave festivals.
This means massive bonuses to everything.

Ethics divergence is -50%. Fanatic spiritualist -30%, Satramene gas -10%, Muutagan crystals -10%. From happiness: -16 to -20%, planetary capital -15%, conformists -20% (tend to use this on other species I integrate). If more is required, symbol of unity building for -10%.
Even across the galaxy my ethics divergence can stay negative.

The result is a play through with little conflict. It's very peaceful, turmoil free, and very diverse. I tend to end up with lots of species in my empire.
Expansion through war is easy by liberating. With all the -ethics divergence the vassal changes it's culture gradually and eventually you can easily integrate, ending up with aliens with high happiness.
I've not had horizon signals when playing as fanatic spiritualist/pacifist yet. That'd be an extra +10% happiness and -5% ethics divergence.

I'm not sure FS is any better than FI when pared with pacifist, though. FI will give you more happiness because of the unique building (+15%) relative to the +10% from Transcendent Republic, and you won't have to worry about non-primary species pops being unhappy due to the FI bonus. And if you grab talented, your leaders start off at level 4 once you unlock Democratic Utopia, which is amazing, particularly for sector governors who I rarely see get up past level 3 before they die. So you get more happiness + happier non-primary species pops, in addition to having the ability to recruit level 4 leaders right off the bat over FS, making replacing leaders as they die a non issue. The -20% food is nice, but I think recruiting leaders at level 4 is probably better than this.

 

[I am Sovereign]

I think we can agree that FS and FI were/are the most usefull ethics till 1.5 is released in two and a half week.
Cope with / or ignore ethic divergence.

The second ethic pick is rather well...secondary. (Though collectivist would boost even further ethic convergence with its unique building and tech and is the best combo with fanatic spiritualist)

Thats why 1.5 and Utopia is so needed/welcomed.

 

[The Founder]

I play stellaris for the most part casually and with mods, that alter balance and whatnot. So I'm not all that used to vanilla nor do I powergame all that much. The other day when sharing our races we made, someone (Xenophobe player) told that that if you play xenophile you lose. And it got me thinking.

From a power gaming or PVP perspective is the xenophobe - xenophile gap really that bad? Or was that person being really pretentious?

Among the most powerfull for a wide play is either Fanatic Individualist with anything that adds happiness (Dodging Ethics divergence while keeping them happy) or Collectivist and Spiritualist (doubling down on Ethics convergence).
Compared to the need to deal with Ethics divergence one way or the other, all other Ethics take a backseat. At least that is true for 1.4.

The Ethos & Faction rework for 1.5 promises to make the ethics generally more competitive, by giving everyone Convergence if they just play according to thier Ethos. And adding the ability to change your Ethics if one does no longer fit. And it will be here by 6th of April, or in about 22 days.

 

[The Founder]

FI will give you more happiness because of the unique building (+15%) relative to the +10% from Transcendent Republic, and you won't have to worry about non-primary species pops being unhappy due to the FI bonus.

Hyperentertainment Forum is powerfull, no doubt. But it also costs a ton of Energy per turn, per planet. 6 is a huge energy drain. Even with 5% happiness less, I would think the Spiritualist Demoracy is superior. Simply because it needs no planetslots and no maintenance.

I would consider Monument of Purity (+10%, no Upkeep) and the Paradise Dome (+10% Happiness, Food and Habitability) to be the better buildings. One comes without upkeep, the other seamlessly integrates into the Food production that you will build anyway.

 

[Qoff]

Probably the most powerful is Fanactic Individualist since you get a lot of happiness, but I love playing Fanactic Spiritualist/Collectivist because of the ethics convergence huge bonuses.

What I learn with Stellaris is that you can make veryone thinks the same but they'll not be happy, or you can let them think whathever they want and they'll be happy.

A powerful combination of ethics convergence and happiness is Fanactic Spiritualist/Pacifist, however you'll not be able to wage irrestricted wars.

 

[forfor]

If you're shooting for pure research, fanatic pacifist+spiritualist are the best ethos imo.
+15% happiness from pacifist
+10% from transcendent republic
+10% from paradise dome
With additional happiness boosters like rigan spice, you can easily hit 100% in peacetime. 100% happiness means 20% bonus to base research added to genetic traits like intelligent and natural physicists which then gets multiplied by the scientist research bonuses(the food bonus from government, and happiness also means you need less tiles for farms. With that + pitharan spice + the food bonus research you can sometimes feed an entire mid-sized colony on just the capital, and an orbital hydroponics. This translates to a couple more research labs per planet)
-10% ethics divergence from spiritualist
-10% from symbol of unity
-10% if you find satramene gas
- a bunch more cause happiness.
This means your economic bonuses stay fairly stable because everyone has negative ethics divergence. You never really have to waste influence on factions outside wartime, so you have more to spare for outposts, meaning more research, and since you can't conquer minor races, you uplift them instead, which means a lot of protectorates giving you more influence, and that translates to even more outposts, meaning you have a ton of bonus resources that don't raise the research costs.

 

[Nesjamag]

I'm not sure FS is any better than FI when pared with pacifist, though. FI will give you more happiness because of the unique building (+15%) relative to the +10% from Transcendent Republic, and you won't have to worry about non-primary species pops being unhappy due to the FI bonus. And if you grab talented, your leaders start off at level 4 once you unlock Democratic Utopia, which is amazing, particularly for sector governors who I rarely see get up past level 3 before they die. So you get more happiness + happier non-primary species pops, in addition to having the ability to recruit level 4 leaders right off the bat over FS, making replacing leaders as they die a non issue. The -20% food is nice, but I think recruiting leaders at level 4 is probably better than this.

Yes, it's very potent as well.
Perhaps the strongest advantage is you can get the leader enhancements without happiness penalty.
And policy effects get a -60% from FI.
It also opens up the game to synthetics.

I'd go with Irenic democracy in a set up like this.

In terms of leader skill levels. Enduring is superior to talented.
And gaining a skill level is better in terms of a chance of giving character traits to leaders.
So aside from the royal gardens building, I'd also go for the Irenic democracy for better leaders.
Ideally you want leaders to live long over starting with high skill.